As a gas chromatography support, sintered diatomaceous earth, which has an appropriate specific surface area, heat resistance, and physical strength, has been widely used since gas chromatography has come into widespread use. However, diatomaceous earth is a natural product, and thus performance as a support varies according to the different mining site, stratum, and the like. Moreover, because diatomaceous earth contains, in addition to silicon dioxide as its main component, metal oxides such as aluminum oxide and iron oxide, these metal oxides serve as factors that cause adsorption of an analyte.
Accordingly, there is a demand for providing a support with a controllable bulk specific gravity, specific surface area, and pore volume without containing impurities such as metal oxides so as to exhibit sufficient performances as a gas chromatography support, together with having a shape, heat resistance, and physical strength usable for a gas chromatography support which replaces diatomaceous earth.
Recently, a silica monolith porous body prepared by a sol-gel method from an organosilicate as a raw material has been attracting attention as a liquid chromatography filler because, for example, it has a large specific surface area, is physically and chemically stable, and can be formed into a variety of shapes (Non-Patent Literature 1). A Silica monolith body has a structure of a three-dimensionally networked porous silica skeleton and flow channels in a body, and are especially expected for use as a liquid chromatography fillers enabling high speed analyses because flow resistance can be lowered in comparison with conventional particulate fillers by adjusting a ratio of mesopores (pore diameter 2 to 50 nm) and micropores (pore diameter 2 nm or less) to macropores (pore diameter 0.5 to 10 μm) that function as flow channels of a carriers.